Astronomy and Space

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Gfamily
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Astronomy and Space

Post by Gfamily » Fri May 22, 2020 9:32 pm

Just out looking at Venus and Mercury

Had to take 3 images (using camera directly attached to the telescope) to get both of them in this stitched photo
V&M.jpg
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Gfamily » Sun May 24, 2020 11:21 am

UK people may be able to see the just launched Dragon Crew mission on Wednesday evening about 15 minutes after its launch scheduled for 21:33 BST.

The ISS (its destination) makes a pass just before 11pm
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Martin Y » Sun May 24, 2020 1:13 pm

Gosh. Nice photo. How far apart were they? I mean, what's the angle of view in that photo, roughly?

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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Gfamily » Sun May 24, 2020 1:29 pm

Martin Y wrote:
Sun May 24, 2020 1:13 pm
Gosh. Nice photo. How far apart were they? I mean, what's the angle of view in that photo, roughly?
Thanks, at the time they were about 1 1/4 degrees apart - equivalent to 2.5 times the width of the full moon.
Physically, Venus was about 44,300,000 km and Mercury about 161,000,000km away.
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Gfamily » Fri Jul 10, 2020 2:40 pm

If you're up late (or early) and have a low horizon to the North and East, have a look for a naked eye Comet (C/2020 F3 Neowise )
Our friend took this photo just before 3am this morning
JH Comet Neowise.jpg
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Below it are some noctilucent clouds
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by shpalman » Sun Jul 12, 2020 8:05 am

Up at 04:30 for this
rps20200712_100401.jpg
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Zoom in of the relevant bit:
IMG_20200712_093728_276.jpg
IMG_20200712_093728_276.jpg (244.74 KiB) Viewed 22497 times
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Gfamily » Sun Jul 12, 2020 8:13 am

Very nice - is that Mars and the Moon off to the right?

We're down in London to set our daughter this weekend so have missed the best nights (mornings) so far for this apparition.

We went out on Richmond Bridge at about 11:30 on Friday night, but it was too early and the comet too low.

We were able to point out Jupiter and Saturn to a couple of passers by though, which was worthwhile.
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by shpalman » Sun Jul 12, 2020 8:22 am

The horizon is very high around here and I don't really have much of a view to the west at all so I thought the early morning would be my best chance. That's Venus over on the right but Aldebaran was visible next to it. Maybe instead a few days* it will be easier to see it in the evenings.

LG phone cameras are pretty impressive, not least because they give you a manual mode in which you can set the ISO and ask for very long exposures. My cheap tripod is a bit wobbly though.
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by shpalman » Sun Jul 12, 2020 8:29 am

The view should have been more or less this, with the comet in Auriga.
Screenshot_20200712-102449.png
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by basementer » Sun Jul 12, 2020 10:52 am

shpalman wrote:
Sun Jul 12, 2020 8:05 am
Up at 04:30 for this
rps20200712_100401.jpg

Zoom in of the relevant bit:

IMG_20200712_093728_276.jpg
Lovely.
Someone on an astro forum that I used to frequent said of comet Hale-Bopp "I'm going to miss it - it somehow makes the night sky complete". One only gets a handful of naked eye comets in a lifetime - I saw Kohoutek, Halley, and Hale-Bopp, but I might well miss this one altogether through my accident of geography. Suffering hemisphere envy.
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by jaap » Sun Jul 12, 2020 11:33 am

We went out at about 0:30-01:00 last night to see the Neowise comet. We drove out to a nearby field to get a low horizon away from the street lights. It was only just visible with the naked eye, but with binoculars it looked great.

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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by johnathan » Mon Jul 13, 2020 2:31 pm

Thanks. You helped me with my homework.

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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by lpm » Mon Jul 13, 2020 2:39 pm

How to see Neo, the one, during July. In a few days it'll be up in the north near the saucepan, the saucepan being the best known constellation.

https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/how-to-se ... t-in-years
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by shpalman » Mon Jul 13, 2020 5:08 pm

The uphelpful thing is that (a) it's not on the Sky Map app but (b) you'll probably need the app to show you where to look because for the moment it's probably going to go below the horizon before the sky is dark enough to see any recognisable constellations.

Well, most of you are probably a lot further north than I am, does that help?

It's too cloudy here to have any hope of seeing it this evening so getting out of bed at 4:30 am on Sunday was totally worth it.
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by basementer » Mon Jul 13, 2020 11:35 pm

Here's a link to the Heavens Above page (set it for your own location and time zone using the link at the top right of the page)

https://www.heavens-above.com/comet.asp ... =0&tz=NZST
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Gfamily » Tue Jul 14, 2020 12:01 am

shpalman wrote:
Mon Jul 13, 2020 5:08 pm
The uphelpful thing is that (a) it's not on the Sky Map app but (b) you'll probably need the app to show you where to look because for the moment it's probably going to go below the horizon before the sky is dark enough to see any recognisable constellations.

Well, most of you are probably a lot further north than I am, does that help?

It's too cloudy here to have any hope of seeing it this evening so getting out of bed at 4:30 am on Sunday was totally worth it.
The free version of Sky Safari (Android definitely: Apple probably) shows the comet.
There's a couple of apps by that name, look for the one by simulation curriculum.
My avatar was a scientific result that was later found to be 'mistaken' - I rarely claim to be 100% correct
ETA 5/8/20: I've been advised that the result was correct, it was the initial interpretation that needed to be withdrawn
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Gfamily » Tue Jul 14, 2020 10:02 pm

Our Astronomy Club members had a busy few days over the weekend

I've collated their images into our Club website's picture gallery
It can take a few seconds to load
https://www.midcheshireastro.co.uk/gallery
My avatar was a scientific result that was later found to be 'mistaken' - I rarely claim to be 100% correct
ETA 5/8/20: I've been advised that the result was correct, it was the initial interpretation that needed to be withdrawn
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Gfamily » Fri Jul 17, 2020 11:16 am

The Royal Astronomical Society are livestreaming a transit of Ganymede across the disc of Jupiter today (between 11am and 4pm UKT)

They're using the Infrared Telescope Facility on Mauna Kea, Hawai'i

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amlUJd2 ... e=youtu.be
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by shpalman » Sat Jul 18, 2020 9:37 pm

rps20200718_233641.jpg
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Martin Y » Sat Jul 18, 2020 9:50 pm

Ooh. Nice.

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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by shpalman » Sat Jul 18, 2020 9:59 pm

I could at best only barely see a hint of it by naked eye though.

On the plus side you can do amazing things with a phone and a tripod these days. Exposures around 3 seconds with 400 ISO seemed to work best. Instagram for post-processing. I don't actually know how the photo really looks since all my screens are in night mode right now.
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by shpalman » Sun Jul 19, 2020 7:19 am

Gfamily wrote:
Tue Jul 14, 2020 12:01 am
The free version of Sky Safari (Android definitely: Apple probably) shows the comet.
There's a couple of apps by that name, look for the one by simulation curriculum.
Yes I am indeed using this app now, so thanks for the suggestion. The alerts for ISS are also useful, so I've watched it go over the past two nights.

Of course you have to disable the app's do-not-disturb feature or else it doesn't give you alerts during the night. Also, phone compasses are never that accurate, but then the comet won't be visible each night until some recognisable stars are visible.

Last night the air in the straight-up direction was relatively clear, but looking towards the horizon there's all sorts of haze and gunk and scattered light from the recently-set sun. So the comet was just about visible when it got dark enough to see stars but before it had gotten too low. I only found it because I was taking long-exposure photos in roughly the right direction and then looking at those. It should get easier to see as it moves up in the sky over the next week or two, and it's getting closer to the Earth but further from the sun so on balance it's getting fainter.

It looks like tonight might be clear too, and maybe there's be less shite in the atmosphere, so I'll be out on the balcony again.
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by shpalman » Sun Jul 19, 2020 9:14 pm

rps20200719_231355.jpg
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ISS photobomb
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by Bird on a Fire » Sun Jul 19, 2020 9:34 pm

That is super cool.
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Re: Astronomy and Space

Post by shpalman » Sun Jul 19, 2020 9:44 pm

I put a sequence on my Instagram.
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